"That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind."
People all over the world have heard this saying.
From the first man in human history to fly off the earth and set foot on the moon - Neil Armstrong .
There is no doubt that he is a hero to mankind.
But what did he go through before he became a hero?
Now someone has made a movie about the hero's landing on the moon, and it is from a new perspective -
first man on the moon
First Man
In 2016, "La La Land" , which swept the world , made director Damien Chazelle the youngest "Best Director" at the Oscars.
From "Blitzkrieg" to "La La Land," Chazelle has proven himself to Hollywood.
The director and screenwriter of the "First Man" project was confirmed as early as 2015.
However, due to various reasons, the production progress of the film has been delayed.
It was not until "La La Land" won the awards season that the "First Man on the Moon" project was finally put on the production schedule.
Chazelle continued to work with Ryan Gosling , the male protagonist of "The Philharmonic" .
The heroine is Claire Foy, who won the Emmy Award for Best Actress for her hit Netflix drama "The Crown . "
The starring is stable, and there are also big coffee behind the scenes.
Spielberg as executive producer, Josh Singer, the screenwriter of popular films such as "Spotlight" and "Washington Post".
The luxurious lineup has made a lot of money for Chong Ao.
After the show, it was also aggressive.
Has won the Hollywood Film Award for Best Director, Editing, and Composer three awards.
It is no exaggeration to say that it is the strongest seeded player at next year's Oscars.
But the film's reviews have been polarized.
Some critics pointed out:
"First Man on the Moon" got a lot right and got a lot wrong.
Let me start with my own opinion: this is a film with equally obvious strengths and weaknesses .
There are two well-recognized classics about space movies.
One is "2001 A Space Odyssey" , which completely subverts our understanding of space;
One is "Gravity," which leaves us with lingering fears about the space crisis.
On the other hand, "First Man on the Moon" ditched gorgeous visual effects and used a lot of handheld photography and subjective perspective .
The advantage of this is to shorten the distance between the audience and the characters, highlighting the realism.
It makes those successful or failed missions thrilling and especially arresting.
In the opening scene of the hero Neil (Ryan Gosling) trying to fly the X15, there is no close-up shot of a plane.
Most of the time in front of the audience is the male protagonist's face.
The numbers that keep beating, the height that keeps rising, pass through the dark clouds, and fly into the unknown.
Violent camera shake can easily make people dizzy.
But this kind of dizziness can just make you better into the character's perspective. The immersive experience is an important dramatic tension that distinguishes "First Man on the Moon" from other space films.
Throughout the film, you'd be hard-pressed to find several panoramic shots of space.
In order to strive for authenticity, the director simply and rudely stuffed the camera into the cockpit.
Presented in front of the audience is a small, sealed space and a close-up of the actor's face.
Create a sense of dizziness brought about by space claustrophobia and weightlessness.
In addition, the color used in this film is very retro, which accurately restores the roughness of the 1960s .
The moon landing part of the final climactic scene.
A feat recorded in the annals of human history, but the director did not deal with it into a magnificent epic.
The moment the capsules were opened, the director did a sound reduction.
On the one hand, it restores the moon in a vacuum state, and on the other hand, it also reflects the inner activities of the characters at this time.
What was Armstrong thinking at the time?
Many people want to know.
As a real historical event, the ending has long been written into our textbooks.
It is doomed that this film cannot attract the audience with the suspense of the story.
So the director tells the story of the moon landing from a very personal perspective.
A big event, he chose a small entry .
Armstrong was originally just a test pilot.
The unfortunate death of her daughter has plunged an otherwise happy family into great pain.
As a trained pilot, no matter how harsh the environment, or even when his life is on the line, he can maintain his composure.
He is not afraid of death.
But his daughter's death knocked him out in an instant.
You can pretend to be calm in front of people, but you can't cry in the back.
This caused him, who didn't speak much, to be more reticent, and he only wanted to use his work to numb himself.
At this time, NASA was recruiting astronauts, and he decided to sign up.
The wife saw it, but didn't know how to comfort her. Their marriage was also in jeopardy.
The film maintains a two-line narrative from the beginning to the end.
One line is the moon landing program, and one line is the Armstrong family.
The director tries to present a reflection on this task by introducing family and social perspectives.
Several flashbacks to her daughter's memories also set the stage for the eventual emotional outburst.
These foreshadowing directors used their shooting skills to deal with restraint, which was directly reflected in the performance of "Commander High".
Except for the crying scene shortly after the opening, the expression of "Commander Gao" was very restrained throughout the whole process.
On the other hand, the director deliberately downplayed the world pattern at that time, such as the Cold War between the United States and Russia, and the space race.
Not even the scene where Armstrong planted the American flag on the moon at the end.
Pictures of real moon landings in history
This "unpatriotic" behavior has caused heated discussions in the United States.
For this reason, US President Trump came forward to boycott the film.
This is like a propositional composition, you step on every score point correctly, but at the end you neither point the question nor sublimate the theme.
In the eyes of Hollywood, who is constantly shouting "political correctness", this is not "an excellent composition".
The director blurs the sense of responsibility and mission for Armstrong's moon landing .
Simply restore this legendary figure from all levels of husband, father, colleague and friend.
This is what he wants to tell us:
A hero is not born a hero.
Heroes are mortals too.
So, in the final moon landing, we didn't see Armstrong's face showing the joy of accomplishing an epoch-making mission.
Armstrong's landing on the moon was nothing more than fulfilling an unfulfilled wish for a colleague.
In the end, he chose to throw the bracelet into the deep pit, and at this time we saw Armstrong's face in front of the camera with the mask down.
The tears on her face are not only her memory for her daughter, but also her own redemption and reconciliation.
In the director's view, becoming a hero requires going through a road full of blood and despair, and love and ideals are the driving force for him to persevere.
All in all, it's a terrific movie.
A tricky subject that doesn't have much new things to dig, and after being integrated into the social and family scenes, the plot is a bit loose, and the movie watching process will feel very "boring".
But to me, what this movie is about is:
Let us have the opportunity to travel through time and space to witness an exciting scene in human history.
Witnessed that in the age of underdeveloped technology, human beings have not stopped exploring the unknown.
As Kennedy put it:
We choose to go to the moon and do other things in this era, not because they are easy, but because they are difficult.
WeChat public account: Tailless Movie
View more about First Man reviews
